Maronite Patriarch Beshara Boutros al-Rai arrived in Damascus on Saturday to attend the enthronement of Syria’s Greek Orthodox leader, Yuhanna X Yazigi, Syrian state television said. The Lebanese National News Agency meanwhile reported that Rai would hold mass at the Maronite cathedral in Damascus later in the evening.

 

The ceremony for the new Greek Orthodox leader is to be held at 8:30 am on Sunday at the Church of the Holy Cross in Qassaa, a central neighborhood of the conflict-hit Syrian capital. Meanwhile, Lebanese Maronite Bishop Samir Mazloum told Al-Jumhuriya newspaper that Rai’s visit will not take on “a political dimension.”

 

“He will make no official visits… to President Bashar al-Assad or other officials.”

 

Rai’s visit to Syria will be the first visit by a Maronite patriarch since independence in 1943, Lebanon’s anti-Syrian regime newspaper An-Nahar reported. [Link]